Now is the Day of . . .: Wednesday Night Stories: Rolled In The Flour

Spending time on a multi-cultural team allows you to learn a lot of new things.

Particularly in the area of language acquisition, and two years ago, I had the joy of learning bits and pieces of French (a language that makes English look wonderfully phonetic).

When you start learning French idioms a theme quickly begins to arise. They all have to do with food. And that's wonderful because it tells you the culture takes food seriously.

One of the only French phrases I know (and recite every chance I get) is: "Occuper de tes oignons." (I feel all French must be italicized)

This literally translates to "take care of your onions" or figuratively (and sassyfrassy), "mind your own business."

One other phrase I learned: to be rolled in the flour. Meaning to be prepped for cooking, or as I like to think of it, getting served. To be tricked or bamboozled or buffaloed.

(Take a moment and appreciate how awesome those synonyms are!)

So, one weekend our team took a trip from our major world metropolis to another major world metropolis a few hundred miles down the rails. We had very little agenda for our journey. We were seeking to get away, to see some sights, and to relax a little, but there was no set schedule or plan.

So we were very pleased to meet a guide at the train station upon arrival who offered to provide the itinerary for us. Better yet, the price seemed very reasonable and he was offering to take us to a number of different sights around and outside the city. Better yet again, his van was sitting right there at the train station and he offered to drive us to our hotel. And while, the ride was an easy opportunity for his sales pitch, it was far cheaper than a taxi, so we were happy to appease him.

We agreed to let him take us on a tour at 9 the next morning, an offer to which he hesitated slightly and then changed the time to 8:30, but we saw no problem. We also noticed he was hesitant to commit to bring his "van" directly to the door of our hotel the next morning and instead insisted that we meet him on foot and that he'd walk with us to the "van", but we figured, "He's a local, he knows the traffic patterns better. Sure."

All in all, we were pretty thrilled with our luck. Within 10 minutes of arriving, we had a ride to the hotel, a plan for the next day, and a very friendly guide. Fantastic.

So the next morning, the guide met us in the lobby at 8:30 and asked that we pay on the spot. This seemed reasonable enough. OK. So we paid our full price and then, he took us out the front door to go around the block where he was parked.

However, when we rounded the corner there was no van. Instead, there was a large coach bus.

Further, before we could ask "What happened to the guided van tour?" We were whisked upon the bus and our "guide" was not joining us. He was gone.

I'm a fairly adaptable guy and I was mostly oblivious to everything that was happening, but our team leaders who were more experienced with this country and they looked a little panicked. The questions were legitimate:

"Why are we on a bus?"

"Is this bus even a tour?"

"If no, where is this bus headed?"

"If yes, what kind of tour might we be embarking on?"

All good questions. And luckily, the bus was packed with nationals toting cameras (a good sign we weren't headed to Uzbekistan) and a couple of employees, who told us we were indeed on a tour.

The employees then took the microphone as the bus pulled away and began talking . . . and talking . . . and talking. There was at least a solid hour of lecture during which I played several games. At this point I'd studied the language for about 4 weeks, so I'd test myself and see how many words I could understand in one minute (usually under 3). Or, I would look very attentively at the speaker and pretend I understood every word, carefully nodding, and trying to laugh when I felt a joke had been made.

I played this game often.

I never won.

But for most of that time, we tried to re-construct what had just happened.

The most likely explanation was this:

1. Our "guide" did not work for the tour company, but did get a cut for "recruiting" suckers from the train station. He had smelled cash from the moment he spotted our uncertain eyes at the platform.

2. The seemingly meaningless change from 9 AM to 8:30 was designed to coincide with the time the bus trip would depart.

3. The bus was parked around the corner because our guide knew we'd likely back out the deal if we knew it was a large group outing.

4. And best of all, he likely made us pay in the lobby because that way the others on the bus couldn't watch our money exchange and let us in on just how much more per person we'd been charged than everyone else.

Also, during the lecture portion of the trip, Tammy provided a translation of the itinerary of the day. It was so fantastic I wrote it down word-for-word. Here it is:

"Next, we will be brought to a . . . factory, where we will get to see how they make . . . something . . . and . . . buy it for . . . kind of expensive prices."

At this point, Rudy taught us the new French phrase, leaning in and asking, "Have we been rolled in the flour?"

And sure enough, next we did go to a silk production facility. And they offered to sell us silk things for . . . kind of expensive prices.

Overall, though, it was really a pretty fantastic tour. After promising to take full responsibility if we failed to get back to the bus in time, we negotiated the right to break off from the main group at each stop and do our own thing.

Look how happy we were!